Cerian

Cerian
Čérízon šérošu čérí
Pronunciation	[[Help:IPA|[[tʃeːˈriːzon] [ˈʃeːroʃu tʃeːˈriː]]]]
Created by	Lili21
Date	Mar 2017
Setting	Calémere
Ethnicity	Cerians
Native speakers	450,000,000 (2312)
Language family	Evandorian languages Central Evandorian Íscégon Cerian

Cerian — natively Čérízon [tʃeːˈriːzon] or šérošu čérí [ˈʃeːroʃu tʃeːˈriː] — is the main global lingua franca on the planet on Calémere, particularly in the nations of its Western Bloc, and its second-most spoken language by number of native speakers (after Chlouvānem). It is an Evandorian language belonging to the Central Evandorian branch, and one of the direct descendants of one of the two most important Classical language of the Calemerian Western civilization, namely Íscégon.

Native to the country of Ceria (Cer.: Čéría; Isc.: Ciairegiion) in the western part of Evandor, Cerian is the official language of seven countries in Evandor - Ceria, Šáritun, Vétaní, Čaga, Rogoma, Noméde Ínéma, and Sternia (Cer. Seténía - co-official with Majo-Bankrávian) - and 37 other countries around the planet. It is also a regionally recognized language in the Evandorian countries of Besagret, Helinetia, Ingvensia, Auralia and Nordulic (Cer.: Bésói, Helinétía, Envenšía, Órolía, Nódóa), and in many other countries of the planet, including even a few areas in the northwestern Chlouvānem Inquisition.

External History

The name Ceria (and therefore Cerian), as with many major Calémerian, particularly Evandorian, peoples and places, dates back to my first proto-conworlding projects, and I simply imported it into Calémere - something that meant justifying the very-IE-looking -ia ending in a Calémerian linguistic perspective.
Cerian itself is the main lingua franca of Calémere, a role equivalent to that English has on Earth, and to some extent English is one of my inspiration, although only as far as Cerian, just like English, has a large number of dialects spoken in many countries across the world. Aesthetically, my main inspirations behind Cerian are Latin, Japanese (mostly in the syllable structure), and to a lesser extent also Norwegian and Swedish. Grammatically I wanted a mostly analytic language, even though in the end it is not as analytic as other Evandorian languages (such as Nordulaki, to name one) and with some SAE traits, most notably phonology (even though that lack of a distinction between /r/ and /l/ is not SAE at all), mixed in with a few non-European traits (such as the tense system).

Phonology

Consonants

The consonant inventory among different Cerian dialects is fairly similar, with the most noticeable exception being Hilly Southeastern Cerian which are the only ones that didn't merge Íscégon /l/ into /r/ (the distinction is still kept everywhere in the spelling - e.g. áleron "road" /ˈaːreron/ even if 95% of speakers merge them). Many Southern Cerian dialects (incl. e.g. Šáritunen Cerian) also have /dʒ/ instead of /ʒ/, as Old Cerian did.

→ PoA ↓ Manner		Labial	Labiodental	Alveolar	Alveolopalatal	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasals		m m		n n
Plosives	Voiceless	p p		t t			k k
	Voiced	b b		d d			g g
Affricates					č tʃ
Fricatives	Voiceless		f f	s s	š ʃ			h h
	Voiced		v v	z z	j ʒ
Trill				r-l r
Approximants		u w				i j

All consonants except voiced fricatives, approximants, /tʃ/ and /h/ can be geminated. Note, though, that /ʃ/ is only geminated in two words, the irregularly spelled ešečen /ˈeʃʃen/ and fášečen /ˈfaːʃʃen/, respectively the habitual and continuous forms of the present subjunctive of íso (to be) - which are used in order to form the subjunctive of all other verbs.

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
High	i í i iː		u ú u uː
Mid	e é e eː		o ó o oː
Low		a á a aː

Vowels are extremely varied in different Cerian dialects, with the long-short contrast being actually realized depending on dialect as a pure quantity one, a quality one, a hybrid quality-quantity, by having monophthongs vs. diphthongs, and with some possible mergers or (more rarely) splits. The phonemic representation given above is conventional and reflects the spelling as well as the underlying phoneme in most (not necessary all) Cerian dialects. For example, élógen "lamp" - phonemically represented as /eːˈroːgen/ is pronounced in different ways, including:

• Evandorian dialects: [e(ː)ˈroːgɐn] (Mánébodin Cerian or Standard Evandorian Cerian), [ɪːˈroːgɪn] (Čagan Cerian), [eə̯ˈʁɔːgən] (Central Coastal), [eˈlogɛn] (Hilly Southeastern - note the conservation of /l/), [(j)eːˈruːgʲən] (Šáritunen)
• Púrítonen dialects: [eɪ̯ˈrʊə̯gən] (NE Coastal Púrítonen), [ɛɪ̯ˈruːgen] (Inland Northern Púrítonen), [eɪ̯ˈʁoʊ̯gen] (Bénáteno Lake)
• Céránentian dialects: [eːˈɾoːgʲɪn] (Cánésen), [eˈruːgʲɪn] (Pásuone)

Some Cerian dialects from Evandor may have kept closer values to Íscégon, notably for example with /iː/ which became /e/ in most Cerian dialects (and is thus represented in the orthography). So for example Šáritunen Cerian speakers pronounce refusécé "castle" (Mán. Cer. [refuseːˈkeː]) as [riːpʉseːˈkeː] - a different development from Íscégon rípsercé. Similarly, rébé "stone" (< Ísc. rírbé) is [riːˈbeː] in Šárituni (St. Cer. [re(ː)ˈbeː]), and jéče "word" (< Ísc. giécí) is [dʒeːˈɕiː] (Mán. Cer. [ˈʒeːtʃɐ]).

Morphology

Prepositions

Cerian uses only prepositions; most of them require the oblique case, but a few ones (notably, re) require the nominative. Many prepositions also have forms contracted with the articles:

Prepositions requiring nominative case:

• biázo – through
• den – about, concerning
• re – of

Prepositions requiring oblique case:

• bi – on
• cato – for (benefactive)
• gáno – under

gáno+šo = gánšo, gáno+šen = gánšen

• in – from; made of

in+šo = ío, in+šen = íjen

• nao – towards
• ó – in, inside

ó+šo = očo, ó+šen = očen

• ton – with

ton+šo = tójo, ton+šen = tójen

• toro – to (dative)

toro+šo = tóšo, toro+šen = tóšen -->

Verbs

Like other descendants of Íscégon, Cerian radically restructured the Íscégon verbal system. While Íscégon had a system of mostly prefixing inflections that mainly changed aspect or valency, these inflections have with time transformed into self-standing verbs, becoming a derivational process rather than an inflectional one (cf. Ísc. táso "I walk", máentáso "I start walking" → Cer. tóson "to go, walk", méntón, earlier méntóson "to depart"). These aspectual inflections and valency changes are now marked by auxiliary verbs or adverbs (with few exceptions); meanwhile, Cerian (and other descendants of Íscégon, as well as some languages influenced by it in a sprachbund covering various parts of central Evandor, most notably Nordûlaki) started cliticizing at the end of the verb various adverbs that served to indicate tense; later on, in Cerian (excluding some Southern dialects) and Péigu only, final -n in some of those adverbs started being analyzed as a feminine marker, which led to it being added to those verbs that did not have it, resulting in the present system that morphologically marks tense and gender.

Morphologically, Cerian verbs are simple and agglutinative, however they are used in various auxiliary constructions in order to mark aspect, mood, and valency.

Tense	Suffix	čeléton "to read"
		Masculine	Feminine
Remote past	-re(n), -e(n)	čelétore	čelétoren
Hesternal past	-(m)óni(n)	čelétóni	čelétónin
Hodiernal past	-aše(n)	čelétuaše	čelétuašen
Present	-∅	čeléto
Near future	-útei(n)	čelétútei	čelétútein
Distant future Speculative future	-tuéle(n)	čeléttuéle	čeléttuélen

Aspectual distinctions are made with forms of the copulae úši (habitual "to be"; ← Ísc. ód-sir) and reuši (continuative "to be"; ← Ísc. riqued-sir), plus the present participle, as in the following examples (note that all these examples may be translated with any subject):

• reuši čelétofú "I (m) am reading", reuši čelétofún "I (f) am reading";
• úšire čelétofú "I (m) used to read", úširen čelétofún "I (f) used to read";
• reušire čelétofú "I (m) was reading [in the past]", reuširen čelétofún "I (f) was reading [in the past]";
• reušimóni čelétofú "I (m) was reading [yesterday]", reušimónin čelétofún "I (f) was reading [yesterday]";
• reušiaše čelétofú "I (m) was reading [earlier today]", reušiašen čelétofún "I (f) was reading [earlier today]";
• reušiútei čelétofú "I (m) will be reading", reušiútein čelétofún "I (f) will be reading";
• úšituéle čelétofú "I (m) may get used to read, will be used to read", úšituélen čelétofún "I (f) may get used to read, will be used to read".

The past participle is used to form passive forms of transitive verbs. In this case, the copula used to build perfective forms is the otherwise causative tíuši:

• tíušimóni čelétti "it (m) was read [earlier today]", tíušimónin čeléttín "it (f) was read [earlier today]";
• úšire čelétti "it (m) used to be read", úširen čeléttín "it (f) used to be read".

Vocabulary

The family

• Family: šo zómo
• Father: šo ófano; mother: šen méan
• Son/daughter: šo/šen bésuon
• Brother: šo císenen; sister: šen ránéco
• Husband: šo ótó; wife: šen čétíren
• Uncle: šo cáruto; aunt: šen cátézin

Basic vocabulary

• Boy: šo cúrasu (dial. also šo vajúni)
• Girl: šen ráginen (dial. also šen vajúnien)
• Friend: šo íporo (m), šen íporian (f)
• Man: šo iróčo; woman: šen térínan
• Pen: šen bícon
• School: šo comíbero
• Ship: šo gama
• Tree: šen tócoro
• to see: sítelon
• to eat: suóron
• to say: poédon
• to do: cáripon
• to sleep: ródónion
• to write: šoséron

Cardinal directions

All of them are masculine (article šo), but the article is always omitted if used without an adjective:

• North: časúné
• South: quéšon
• West: uíra
• East: mutin

Example texts

UDHR Article 1

(I'll probably replace this with something more Calémerian, maybe the Calémerian analogue to the UDHR?)

Pérécito fín sucáreien bácífaten de rédo gánšen cetorénani de fáteren. Turóteon súno socánue de toncoráfa, de étoreien cato usúron si bevenuzáe ešečen tójo ráziron usúnnonno ton foríton re císenečéta.

All humans are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Gloss:

human.NOM. every. be_born-PRES.HAB. free. and. equal. under-the. dignity-OBL. and. right-OBL. | possess-PRES.HAB. 3PL.MASC.NOM. reason.NOM and. conscience.NOM. and. suppose-PRES.HAB. for. 3PL.MASC.OBL. that. act-PART.PRES.ACT. be-SUBJ.PRES.HAB. with.the. other-OBL. their-OBL. with. spirit-OBL. of. brotherhood.NOM.

IPA (Standard Evandorian Cerian):

[peːˈreːkito ˈfiːn suˈkaːrejɪn baːˈkiːfəten də ˈreːdʊ ˈgaːnʃən ketoˈreːnəni də ˈfaːtəren] [tuˈroːteo̞n ˈsuːnʊ soˈkaːnwe də tonkoˈraːfə | d‿ˈeːtʊrejɪn cat‿uˈsuːrʊn sɪ bevenuˈzaː‿ˈeʃʃən toːʒʊ ˈraːzɪron uˈsuːnnʊnʊ ton foˈriːtʊn rə kiːsəneˈtʃeːtə]